is this this is an interesting comment. dick durbin has been on the show and he's so rational and open to compromise. he was open to closing loopholes and not raising rates. he's a rational man, and he said yesterday that democrats shouldn't be talking about cutting social security. here he is. >> social security does not add one penny to our debt. it's a separate funded operation. medicare is another story. only 12 years of solvency lie ahead if we do nothing, so those who say don't touch it or change it are ignoring the obvious. >> will democrats have the courage to make serious cuts to medicare and not two years over ten years? >> first of all, i think there's a serious cut, and a lot of people that say that people would defer it. >> i'm not implying it's not a serious cut. i'm sorry. i meant you had to do it over a smaller period of time. >> right. i understand. but i want to go back to senator durbin's point. if you want to do something social security, do it. leave social security in the debt aside for the moment, because it doesn't drive debt. i think senator durbin is right on that. they have to negotiat

groups of voters. >> and what about on cuts, james, this is an interesting comment. dick durbin has been on this show, he's such a rational person that seems so open to compromise. he was open to closing loopholes but not raising rates, he's looked for cuts. he's a rational man in many ways. he said yesterday the democrats should not be talking about cutting social security. here he is. >> social security does not add one penny to our debt. not a penny. it's a separate funded operation. medicare's another story. only 12 years of solvency lie ahead if question do nothing. those who say, don't touch it, don't change it are ignoring the obvious. >> democrats have the courage to make serious cuts to medicare. >> first of all. i think it's a serious cut. a lot of people that tell you that would defer it. >> i'm not implying it's not a serious cut, i'm sorry, i just meant you would have to do it over a smaller period of time. >> right, i understand, but i want to go back to senator durbin's point, if you want to do something about social security, do something about social security. but leave

, a wealthy state. i spoke with senator dick durbin two weeks ago, and we were talking about a compromise, if there was a way to raise the money from the wealthy that the president wants to get from raising tax rates on people or households making over $250,000, whether there was another way to do it. here's another clip of that. >> -- did an analysis saying you could cap deductions at $35,000 and have the estate tax go back to where it was and you get $1.3 trillion. you cap deductions at $25,000 and you've got $1.3 trillion. i'm simply making the point, there's a lot of ways to get there that don't involve raising tax rates, is that a compromise you'd ever consider? >> erin, you're exactly right. but i think what the president's trying to say is let's protect working families. those making less than $250,000 a year, no tax increase for them. we can do it either through the rates or through the deductions in the code, you've given a good illustration. >> and what do you think about that senator warren. durbin making it clear he's -- there's a lot of different ways to get there. would you

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